As public schools are set to resume in Imo for the 2023/2024 Academic year, one issue that will bother many parents and guardians in the state, is the reality that public primary schools are yet to conduct the Common Entrance examination for the outgone Basic Six pupils who are supposed to be admitted into Junior Secondary School One, JSS 1 this term.
It will be recalled that public primary schools in Imo State ended the 2023/2024 session without sitting for the Common Entrance and the First School Leaving Certificate, FSLC, examinations. This is even when many of the pupils registered and paid for the said examinations.
The real question now that public schools are about resuming for a new academic session is what the pupils who wish to proceed to Public Secondary schools will do given also the fact that neither the Imo State Universal Basic Education Board, IMSUBEB, nor the Ministry of Education has addressed the issue at least, to reassure the apparently worried parents and their wards.
Another serious angle to it, is whether Imo public secondary schools will not admit JSS1 students in the new session.
There is also the question of what will be the fate of parents particularly, many of them in rural areas who obviously may not be able to afford private secondary schools for their wards.
We urge the authorities of the Ministry of Education and IMSUBEB to quickly address this issue. They can devise other criteria for admissions into JSS1 in the public secondary schools, if they are unable or do not have the logistics to conduct the examinations.
Doing so will save many parents the financial hassles associated with trying to register their wards in expensive private schools as an alternative, especially, now that times are very hard for the average Nigerian.